Substantiality

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"I see people in the world throw away their lives lusting after things… never able to satisfy their desires… falling deep into despair and tormenting themselves…"

The ground swims before his eyes, an eclectic sea of red and brown meshing harshly. For a moment he has to think about the state of things: was it the wind around him howling in such guttural disparity, or was that the sound of his own breathing? Had the earth been seized up in the throngs of a sudden, violent earthquake, or was it his own miserably trembling limbs shaking that left the earth quaking?

"Even if they get what they want, how long will they be able to enjoy it?"

He shakes his head slowly, a pendulum-like movement that sends his stomach into matching fits of motion. The sudden swoop in his gut makes him dry heave, an action he hurriedly covers with an exaggerated cough. A shuddering inhalation follows.

"For one heavenly pleasure — just one — they suffer ten torments of Hell, binding themselves more firmly to the grindstone…"

A harsh gust of wind rips angrily over the land dredging up a thick, nearly unbreathable miasma of sand-congealed air. A spray of loose sand and debris pelts him, leaves him veiled in a thin layer of dust and grime. He pays it no mind. After all, what was a little sand and grime on top off the blood? What did it really matter?

"Such people are like monkeys—" A mutinous laugh follows the words, a hysterical noise bordering lunacy. The wind continues to rip at the land with boundless ferocity and his laugh joins its mournful howl until inexorably, the two entities merge, forming a single, melancholic harmony.

"—Like monkeys…" he repeats in monotone, his fingers convulsing against the bloodied ground, groping desperately for some sort of handhold; some sort of strength to cling to. "—Frantically grasping for the moon in the water —" Anything to keep his mind from slipping, something to keep his sanity grounded and his brain from treading quicksand. But despite his efforts, he can not get his nails to dig in deep enough; his grasp on reality was leaving him just as steadily as the loose earth was slipping between his bruised fingers. The harder he pressed the dirt into his hands, the harder he struggled to cling to substance, the faster it trickled away. "—And then falling into a whirlpool."

As the words leave his lips the winds die down and for a moment the world becomes utterly silent, unbearably silent. He shakes his head again, a mechanical gesture at best, and stumbles in slight delirium to his feet. The hair on the back of his neck prickles, but he is well aware that he is being watched; three pairs of eyes are on his turned back, are watching him. He knows this without his primal, bodily instincts telling him so. As well, he knows that those three pairs of eyes are undoubtedly waiting for him to make his next move.

He steadies himself, braces himself for a moment against the harsh wind that dances its ravaging dance once more across the God forsaken landscape, and mumbles a barely audible:

"…How endlessly those caught up in the Floating world suffer…"

Then, with three pairs of eyes at his back he shows them what they are waiting for, makes his next move — walks away.

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Author's Ramblings: The initial idea: "What's a few more months waiting?" In regards to forever, a few months bode a very short, insignificant time. In regards to unaccountability and human mortality, a few months may bode not soon enough. So, when does time become truly substantial?

How long can one truly expect to wait for a loved one's return?

Not wholly sure where I'm going with this, but I've got the gist of it. One or two more chapters at most. For those of you familiar with my current WIP, Enigma, this is a sort of reprieve. I'm letting the muse breath and come back naturally.

All names welcome at the door with honest opinions intact. So long as they are honest, I don't care what they are.

Blackrose